Differential pressure transducer devices are known in the art. Such prior art devices typically employ mechanical or semiconductor properties to translate a detected differential pressure variation into an electronic signal such as a voltage signal.
Differential pressure transducers of the prior art suffer from a number of operational restrictions. Mechanical differential pressure transducers are generally physically too large to be directly compatible with circuit integration, and are typically slow to respond to pressure variations.
Semiconductor-based differential pressure transducers may be realized in a form typically smaller than the mechanical differential pressure transducer devices. However, semiconductor-based differential pressure transducers are generally still too large to conveniently incorporate into an integrated structure. Additionally, the response time of prior art semiconductor-based differential pressure transducers is too slow for many applications.
Accordingly, there exists a need for a new differential pressure transducer which overcomes at least some of the shortcomings of the devices of the prior art.